Originally shared by Stephen Baird
This is the DLP printer I built for myself out of leftover bits and pieces of other projects. Old misumi extrusion both from a printer that never went together and the leftover bits from a printer that did go together, extra bits of linear rail, a ball screw that never found a home, an old sanguinololu that has since been replaced with modern electronics… that sort of thing. The only things I purpose-bought for this were the projector (an Acer X154H) and a SeeMeCNC flex vat kit. The rest was scavenged, printed, and bodged together.
It works surprisingly well, too. The first two pictures of prints are the first test print, first from the top (looks pretty good) then from the side (looks… not so good). My measurement of the printable area was off, so the aspect ratio of the object was wrong, but that was an easy fix. I had also forgotten to change the z-steps/mm value, hence the serious squash, but that was an easy fix too.
The second set of two pictures is the next print, and reveals some deeper issues I need to work on. For one thing, I think exposure time is too long (from 11000ms in the first print to 7000ms in the second) because that’s typically a cause of the puffy look… I think? But the z-axis apparently isn’t quite perpendicular to the build plate, because the object has a bit of a slant to it. It’s small, but definitely there. I think I know where that problem is being introduced, though, so a fix shouldn’t be too hard.
…given the quality of the tops, I’m extremely hopeful for the quality I can look forward to after getting these problems fixed. The projector seems to focus nicely across the entire field, and is focused down to each pixel corresponding to about .054mm, so I should be able to get some good (if small) quality prints. Eventually.
I’ve also realized that perforating the build plate with a grid of small holes is an extremely good idea, and that a quick release of some kind for the build plate would be fantastic. But I’m not sure off the top of my head how I’ll work that one out.
Spend thousands just to print a cube
Actually, it’s more like spend $450 to print a few calibration objects in preparation for printing masters for molding for tabletop games. But yes, the process DOES involve printing a cube, because I’ve printed it a thousand times before and know its dimensions and know exactly what it should look like and it contains nothing that would be difficult to print so the sources of error are minimized.
I’m with @Michael_Johnson … wow, incidently, can you send me the remaining bits in your scap bin??.. gees
Haha, well, this ate up most of what I had in the good leftovers pile over the last few months. I’ve still got about a meter of 2020 extrusion in one big piece, two 550mm pieces of 2060, a grab bag of very short bits of various extrusions, two or maybe three steppers, a RAMBO controller, a random heated bed, and some GT2 pulleys with 8mm rather than 5mm bores.
Unfortunately, I can’t think of anything great to make with what I’ve got left for leftovers. But eventually I’m sure I’ll hit on something, possibly after the scrap pile has grown again.
for alling plate use ball head camera bracklet it used on kudo titan1 and work amazing for aling.
Would you mind sharing what resin and projector you used?
Sure, the projector is an Acer X152H and the resin is Vorex grey by Madesolid. It’s the only resin I’ve tried so far, but it has worked nicely. I picked up a small bottle of it from a Micro Center while on a business trip a month or two ago, so there’s no special reason I started with that one.
@Stephen_Baird so 450$ just to play tabletop games??? Have fun…I guess…
No, $450 to make myself masters for molds for anything I’d like to make, but my immediate plans all relate to tabletop games.
I won’t be copying models; I’ll be designing, creating, and producing them.
Have you done much mastering and casting? Getting molds, or masters you use to produce molds, CNCed somewhere would quickly add up to much more than I’ve spent on this printer and subjects you to feature size and overhang limitations that a printer like this doesn’t. And that process also has no fudge factor in it, your model has to be right the first time or you’ve got a nice chunk of aluminum or steel that’s utterly useless for its intended purpose.
Not to mention, even if I was for some reason going to use this to duplicate existing tabletop models, it’s pretty easy to hit $450 in models for just about any tabletop game.
If you have such a dim view of the utility of 3D printing, why are you even a member of this group?
@Stephen_Baird I’m not saying 3d printers are useless, they are a jackpot for any engineer. Its the way you are using it .and it was a way of me questioning (in a good way) on what your were doing. I would just use 3d printers to build aircrafts and spacecrafts, or try to make parts for a cold fusion reactor. Just relax I was just curious…
@Stephen_Baird Have you seen my many-maker campaign http://www.many-maker.com ? It is ideal for injection mouding table top game models.
